America’s Hidden Strategy: The Method Behind Trump’s Chaotic Foreign Policies

Just when it seemed like the never-ending pattern of violence would repeat forever in the Middle East, Trump shocked the world by dropping more explosive tonnage on Iran's nuclear program than America dropped on Hiroshima or Nagasaki. While it is far too early to know if this will bring peace or more chaos, it is clear that this is a pivotal moment in Middle Eastern history. And joining me today to unpack the likely outcomes of this critical turning point is free press columnist and host of the Breaking History podcast Eli Lake. We discuss whether Trump is an Israeli puppet, whether Iran actually had a nuclear breakthrough or if there is something more nefarious going on, and what all of this means for America and Trump's America Inc. Strap in because this is a wild time to be alive. What do you think about the people who seem very convinced that all of the US just dances to Israel's tune, that Trump is working with Netanyahu? Um, yeah, what where does that stem from and do you think there's any truth to it? It's a canard, but it goes back, you know, centuries. This is a classic anti-Semitic trope that Jews are not loyal citizens. Uh, this was a huge part of the Dreyfus affair in France that inspired Theodor Herzl to come up with Zionism itself. Um, and then in the modern context since the state of Israel was born in 1948, there has always been this uh view that Israel is somehow manipulating things. Um, it depending I mean if we had another person on here who wanted to make that argument, I could probably go through fact by fact about how they got the argument wrong, but here's just I mean we don't even need to do that. On Tuesday morning, Trump went out to the reporters and I think he put it on Truth Social. He said, you know, I don't know if I'm allowed to curse he said, "Iran and Israel have been fighting and they don't know what the F they're doing." And then he demanded that Netanyahu turn, you know, the planes around that were planning a bombing mission over Iran. That doesn't look like a puppet to me. He he he looks like Trump's calling the shots. And then as for like this idea that it's the Israelis that are injecting the intelligence and so forth, it is a conspiracy theory. The truth of the matter is is that if you just look at this objectively, we've seen the demonstration that the Israeli Mossad has extraordinary intelligence and penetration of the Iranian regime. Um we've also seen the demonstration over tragically decades now that the United States intelligence community, in my view, is too big, gets big questions wrong. Uh as somebody who's covered it very closely, I know of at least twice in the last 20 years that American uh spy networks in Iran have been rolled up by the Iranian regime. Mhm. So it actually leads me to the question is that on the one hand, did Israel share information with the United States? Of course they did. The United States is Israel's most important ally. Allies share intelligence. That's normal. The question that I would ask is why would you trust in the American assessment on Iran over Israel, which just demonstrated they have this place wired? It strikes me that just using the razor of Occam, that Israel's intelligence probably be better. Um and then there's a lot of sharing um that we don't know about cuz intelligence world exists, you know, in the shadows for a reason. But I would imagine that a lot of information that Israel's sharing is verified through electronic sources by the Americans. And just to kind of give give you a little bit of a background on this, the US is better than anyone in the history of the world in terms of technical collection, meaning our ability to hoover up stuff on the internet or even in the air in terms of wireless. Um is it is is unsurpassed. We have the ability to kind of basically probably listen to any tap anyone's listen to any conversations we want, read anyone's email that we want. Great. Um it's a extraordinary. What we're not as good at and the Israelis I think are much better at is what's called, you know, human sourcing. Getting agents to turn to work for you. It's a nasty business. The Israelis are very good at that. The Soviets used to be excellent at that. The Russians are ex- quite good. The Chinese are quite good. Uh the US I think is less, you know, we we we do it, but we're not as good. Iran seemed to go from side dish to main dish really fast. Do you think that something just clicked over from uh their capability to build a nuclear weapon or was this uh we knocked out the air defense and so it's just opportunistic? Well, it's a couple things. I think you have to look at the proxy strategy as part of the nuclear strategy, which is to say what the proxies were when they were intact because Israel decimated them before the strike as part of the October 7th war. Um but what you'd have to say is that if the Iranians were to get a nuke, it would have provided a kind of nuclear umbrella for these forward uh positioned militias. So Israel was in a strategically perilous situation you could argue on October 7th. Horrific attack from Hamas. It's not clear whether the supreme leader of Iran or the late generals of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps knew that this was in the works. They There was a meeting in Lebanon with a very senior Revolutionary Guard Corps official. They I I Israelis put this intelligent out a few intelligence out a few months ago which showed that there was sort of discussion about it. I think the Iranians wanted to have more of a coordinated attack. The Hamas went through with it anyway. But in terms of culpability, Hamas in many ways is sustained through uh Iran. It's part of this proxy network. So that's one element of how the Iranian nuclear program is related to that. The other is that it's the line of defense in some ways or at least it was hoped to have been the line of defense um for Iran if there was this day that eventually came where the Israelis would attack the nuclear program. So the response would be like, are you sure you want to do that because Hezbollah had hundreds more than 100,000 rockets. The um Hamas had their own capabilities. So an attack on Iran would bring these attacks again from the proxies. So if you think about October 7th, the Israelis were caught unaware. It's one of the worst days in the history of Israel, history really of the Jewish people, worst killings of Jews since the Holocaust. And since then, Israel has systematically gone after those proxy networks including the Houthis. The Houthis are still standing. But every single one of them um is now pretty much gone. After Israel killed the leader of uh Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah in the fall of 2024, the Iranians launched a barrage of ballistic missiles largely successfully defended by Israel. Israel responded by a daring attack that took out Iran's sophisticated air defense systems. So they were left vulnerable in the country. That was the window of opportunity. And then you add to that, and I should say in the fog of war, we don't know, but Benjamin Netanyahu, the Prime Minister of Israel, and the Israelis themselves claim that they saw recently um unprecedented steps to the last piece of the puzzle, which is to put um the either the uranium in the actual warhead or finish the warhead design so that they were getting to that place where uh the Iranians could have a nuclear weapon whenever they wanted. Again, to me I think the casus belli was established on October 7th, even before. So, it's not an Iraq war situation where you're going to worry about the intelligence, but the the extent of the Iranian program was such, especially in their activities enriching to 60%, there's no peaceful purpose for that. That's not for energy. That tells us that they they had a weapons program and then was they were just sort of inching closer and closer to the goal line. Now, do you think in the fullness of time as we do find out whether they actually did make some big leap forward or this was like you said just written in stone from the time that October 7th happened? Do you think it's going to matter to public opinion about this attack? No. Um I actually think that um I mean, I again, I'm not I have nobody seen the intelligence except for the Israelis and I suppose the American part of it. You know, Trump and Netanyahu perhaps have seen the intelligence and and and their top intel people and military people, but um what matters in this case is success. I mean, I think that we wouldn't have had a huge debate in America 20 years ago about the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq if the post um this is a point that Jonah Goldberg made in recently, but I think he's right. If if if if we'd stabilize the country and there wasn't an insurgency and you know, Saddam Hussein had fallen and Iraq was, you know, largely pacified and rebuilding, I don't think it really would have mattered much um if you would have found the stocks of weapons of mass destruction. It's It's only when the war becomes a slog and sucks the United States into a kind of you know, nation-building stabilization effort that obviously lasted years and years and years, that's when you know, you're looking for like, okay, well, why did we get into this war? What's going on? I think what we're going to find out and and we're starting to see, I mean, it's early days, but the Israelis kind of came out with a statement about their damage assessment. I think we're going to find out that the Iranian program has been set back by years. That will be a success. The United States didn't get dragged into a long drawn-out occupation of Iran. Uh, there wasn't the nightmare scenario where the regime precipitously fell, toppled too soon, and then, you know, there's anarchy on the ground and there's nuclear materials and so forth. Uh, there will be some negotiations. We'll see how those go, but I think they will see this is largely a successful war. What's going to be the criteria by which they determine whether this was success or not? I think the success criteria is that the Iranian program from soup to nuts, from not just the enrichment facilities, which we all talk about, but like the factories where they built the centrifuges, the places where they turned the enriched uranium into the metal that they need, you know, to sort of, you know, fuel a bomb or reactors and things like that. All of the different pieces. You look at all of the scientists who've been taken out in the first few hours of the war. Uh, that's accumulated kind of intellectual capacity. If it turns out that the Iranians are it's just too daunting a task or they're several years away, I think that will be the success, but then, in a way, it's not not fully a success, I think, until there's an organic I mean, this is sort of separate from the war, but I think it's related, which is that this is a regime that um, you know, would be best left in the dustbin of history. And the ideal way to transition out of that regime would be for the kind of democratic uprising that we saw at the end of the Cold War in Eastern Europe or for that matter uh in 2000 with Slobodan Milošević uh in Serbia after he tried to steal an election. So, if we can see an organic democratic transition, then it's got to be organic, meaning it's got to come from the Iranian people and it's got to lead to some sort of democratic outcome and I think that's very much in the cards. The Iranians have had five national uprisings since 2017. Before that, there was 2009 in the Green Movement. Every few years, the Iranian people remind us that the majority of them despise their leaders. So, in my view that there is some there is a strategy, not so much for the Trump administration or for foreign governments, but for people to very similar to what we had in the 1980s uh with the Solidarity Movement in Poland where lots of people supported the Polish kind of aspirations to govern themselves and not be a satellite of the Soviet Union. I think we have a we can have an opportunity in Iran. My dream, I'm not saying anybody will listen, is that if all of the sort of misplaced solidarity on college campuses in the West for Hamas after October 7th instead was you know, kind of focused on the Iranian people um that would be wonderful, but it's and and it's not just, you know, thoughts and prayers. There are things like Elon Musk can do, like Elon Musk there is Starlink that can defeat internet censorship in Iran, but the software that's necessary uh or the actual phones themselves to have Starlink on your phone is not really in Iran. Let's flood Iran with Starlink phones. If the devastation is as Trump certainly would have us believe and these facilities have really been decimated and they see it up close, do you think this increases the likelihood that there is a democratic uprising? I would say that historically there were there was a massive bombing campaign in Kosovo before the uprising in Serbia. But this is a humiliation for a regime and you have to look at it from the perspective of the Iranians. The Iranians the Iranian regime, the Islamic revolution gave us um kind of Islamic tyranny. They call themselves an Islamic republic. It's not really a republic. It's a tyr- it's it's a tyrannical system. And the system is very much infused with um uh an almost end times belief in the um hand of God. So that God is favoring this regime and that it has the momentum on its side. This is a demonstration that I mean, to put it in the those terms that maybe God does not love this regime. I think the Iranian people are over and done with it. The Iranian people are I mean, I've been to Iran once. But I would just say the Iranian people, they they just want to move on and I think they would like to live in a kind of normal modern country and to work it out themselves. There have been examples of kind of, you know, constitutionalism in Iranian history, recent history I should say. They're not destined to live under a dictator. Um but what it means is for the mid-level people in the regime, the apparatus, they you know, maybe the below Brigadier General in the Basiji, which is their kind of internal militia force or their anti-riot police. People like that who on the one hand have to know that they're they're despised by most of their neighbors. And now you have evidence that like the grand plan isn't working. And by the way, that has been the message really I would say since the daring operations in Lebanon against Hezbollah, the killing of of Nasrallah and the top Hezbollah leadership. Um there has been a kind of just momentum on the Israeli side. And at a certain point there's been no real response. And like, you know, I think the most telling thing that we saw in Trump's statements and tweets or Truth Social posts was when he said, "Uh I want to thank Iran for informing us before their attack on Qatar." I mean, that that exposes that this was just theatrical. It wasn't a serious attack. So, there the regime will try to sort of say, "Oh, we survived. We won." That's their narrative. I I have to think that nobody even in the inner circle is going to believe that. Mhm. And then you've got a very old supreme leader. He's 86 years old, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. He is now trying to get his son to be sort of to to to be the next supreme leader cuz, you know, he may not have many years left, any months left, who knows. Um I don't think that's going to go down very well. So, there could be a real fight over succession. And that divides the elites and the leadership. There you have the sort of opportunity. But the key thing to watch here is and this is true, by the way, not just in Iran. It's true in every single example of successful paper people-powered revolutions, which is will the um you know, will the will the police officer, will the will the national, you know, will the will the army guy follow the order to shoot at the peaceful demonstrators? Yeah. And that is something that nobody I can't know from the outside, you can't know. But I would say that this humiliation of the regime maybe gets us closer to that. It's almost like you have to assume you got to put yourself in the mindset of somebody saying, "Do I really want to be the one who's going to have the blood on my hands yet again? Do I want to follow this out? Are those incentives worth it to me?" And there's a strategy, obviously, for uh the insurgents that the the Democrats in this particular situation. They have to create a space where they're welcoming of the defectors, if you will, from the regime. Um, but I have reason to believe that that that there are Iranians who understand that. But we also have to understand the regime has been utterly brutal when it comes to suppressing these sporadic, but increasingly frequent kind of democratic uprisings and just, you know, evidence of disgust and and and uh with with how they're being governed. It's It's corrupt. They're isolated. They're endangered. They're There's a a drinking water crisis in Iran right now. There have been bank collapses. Um and meanwhile, uh you know, it's it's a powerful message. You look at the luxury apartments that were where the Iranian generals were were sleeping that the Israelis got in that first The Israelis made sure to put out the video of that. Most Iranians don't live that well. Mhm. So, these are things that we'll have to see. Again, it cannot be you know, the CIA or the Mossad you know, pulling the strings. You can't have a guy on a white horse coming in like the son of the late Shah, Reza Pahlavi, although I think he means well and there might be a role for him, or Maryam Rajavi, who lives in Paris. It has to come from the Iranian people, but I do think that there's an opportunity and I think that there's something that the West and the and the people who care about this can do. That's To me, that would be the the full victory. Speaking of the West, what do you think of the um division that's growing in the right? So, you've got some people that just feel absolutely betrayed by Trump getting us involved in what they see as another war. They seem absolutely unconvinced that Iran was about to have a nuclear weapon. Uh you've got Tulsi Gabbard saying uh sort of cryptically, but they don't have nuclear capabilities. They have not authorized the bomb. Like, what are we doing? I actually think that um, there it will be insignificant. Um, you know, first of all, the intervention in Iran, which was I mean, you think about it, it was one bombing mission demonstrating new weaponry. Uh, like what, it lasted 45 minutes and then they were on their way home. The second thing is that we didn't get sucked into World War II, a regional war, or a regime change nation building war. I don't think any of that was a possibility with Trump as the president. And frankly, I don't think even if you had, you know, President, you know, John McCain, Wolfowitz, Neocon, it wouldn't have been a possibility because America is a different place in 2025 than it was in 2003. There's an interesting discussion as to why in 2003 we thought that we could do anything in the world and build nations in the Middle East. Um, I was around back then. I was a kind of a junior State Department correspondent for UPI and I later worked for the New York Sun, but, you know, I believed it. I'll I'll I'll cop to that, but we don't think that anymore because in part because of the experience of Afghanistan and Iraq. Um, so, anyway, what we have is a situation where uh, I think it was a short, successful war. President Trump is the leader of the movement. And things are going to move on. And the problem for the Tulsi Gabbard, Tucker Carlson crowd is they predicted that this would lead to utter catastrophe. And they oversold the negative consequences of this. And I think in in that sense they may lose some credibility because those their predictions didn't come true. But I also think that it will be fairly easy to simply say that we didn't we were against Iraq and Afghanistan style wars, but these kind of wars are okay, or these kind of wars are different. And I so I don't expect there to be uh, a kind of permanent split. It may be impossible at this point in terms of the administration for Tulsi Gabbard to stay in the administration because the president has said now openly I think twice that he doesn't care what his director of national intelligence thinks. And if by the way if that is the case, he shouldn't be the national intelligence director of national intelligence. But you know, it's an unconventional administration so we'll see what happens. But I just don't I just don't see this as being a major split. I think that there was a big split before and Trump did what he said he was going to do. But he's been saying it for 10 years. Iran can't have a nuclear weapon. Yeah, I was going to say though that that's the drum that he beats and so I I'm not sure that this is going to blow over as readily as maybe you do because if Trump was saying they can't have a nuclear weapon and then if the debate becomes but show me the evidence that they were that something happened that upgraded the threat to like an imminent threat. And I have a feeling they're going to have a hard time doing that. I think the real answer is this was opportunistic that Israel had taken out their air cover that we could finally go in and do it that we could force them back to the table. I think I think the way that this is going to play out in the near future is Trump is going to be looked at as somebody who said we have an opportunity. I told them they had 60 days. They didn't come to the table. Now people will know that I'm for real. And when I look at the world through a realpolitik lens, I'm like yeah, that makes sense. That honestly from a realpolitik standpoint is probably what he should do so that people know that he's not playing around. But the words we were told was that this was a suddenly something had happened. We have intelligence. This is now an imminent threat. And I have a feeling that's going to remain thin. I hear you but I I just think that these things I think you're we'll see but I just think it's not going to be like a gotcha. I think that, you know, nothing succeeds like success is a kind of is a cliche, but this was pretty successful military operation. What do you think the odds are that Iran actually um doesn't fire either directly or through a proxy? Cuz I think they've already kicked the IAEA out and said, uh "No, we're still going to do this." We'll get back to the show in a moment, but first I want to talk about an important question you should ask before investing in crypto. What happens if someone gets in my account? 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This is a paid advertisement. And now, back to the show. I expect there will be some sort of negotiations. Iranians are over a barrel, though. I mean, at any point, Trump can say, "Okay, boys, tell the Israelis to go back in." Israelis have an air corridor. It's remarkable to me. I mean, we should just take a moment to kind of marvel at this fact. The new leader of Syria is a former member of Al-Qaeda in Iraq and was an absolute at one point in his, you know, interesting journey was a dedicated anti-American religious fanatic jihadist. And he was asked, "Do you have any problems with the Israelis using Syrian airspace?" And he said, "Nope. Fine with me." Now, there's a reason for that. And it's be It's because he was drawn into the Syrian Civil War of the 2010s. And the drivers of the worst cruelty, the worst war crimes in Syria in that time was the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps and their proxy militia Hezbollah. The Sunni jihadists, on the other hand, while Israel certainly didn't, you know, had I mean, there obviously there are theological major distinctions there, but the Israelis built a field hospital uh over the Syrian border that was open to the partisans who were fighting in that civil war as a kind of humanitarian gesture. Um the What's interesting to me is that this guy who, you know, has the background that he does, he is not interested in a fight with uh Israel. He has far He is far more interested in defanging um Iran. And that goes, by the way, if you look at the statements from Saudi Arabia, from the Gulf states, they initially criticized it, they're covering their bets. These are cautious monarchies. But then, words over, and they're all It's nothing but praise for Israel. Um that's a sea change in the region. And it I think it will be very good for the Trump the first-term Trump foreign policy success known as the Abraham Accords, which saw normalization of relationships between um Sudan, United Arab Emirates, Morocco. I might be leaving a few out, but there's a chance you could get the big dog, Saudi Arabia, to finally recognize what they had been have for nearly 80 years called a Zionist entity. That's enormous, Tom. So, in that respect, um I just think that Iran is in an impossible position. The other thing to notice, by the way, Israel attacks Iran, where was Russia? Iran provides Russia with the drones that are, you know, uh aimed at apartment buildings and hospitals and other civilian targets in Ukraine. Where was the Chinese? Where was the remnants of its proxies like Hezbollah? Do you think that Russia's just too bogged down in what they're doing? Yeah, part of it is that the Russians were bogged down, but part of it is that the kind of axis of China, North Korea, Russia, Iran is not an alliance based on shared values. It's not It's It's not an alliance based on shared history. Um it's a little bit like the five families. You know, I mean, when when the FBI is about to crack down on the mafia, the five families will occasionally work together. They try to work together. But then, you know, every few years there's a there's a gang war. And so, they don't Iranians learned also they don't have any real friends. Uh the Iranians tried to get, you know, the UN Security Council to to to to jump into action. Um you know, the Chancellor of Germany, who has been in so critical of Israel in the Gaza war, came out with a statement saying that Israel's doing the world's dirty work. So, what's interesting here is that the Iranians are totally alone. And uh no no defenses. Uh they have no ability to stop the Israelis. The Israelis obviously have a kind of unprecedented world historic level of intelligence penetration of the Iranian regime. It's crazy. As it's crazy how many of their leader their military leaders they've about to take out. Um, so this is an interesting moment because it's it's not to say that, you know, you're not going to be able to be on a on a boat in the Pacific and you dictate the terms of surrender, but it's the negotiations now are something like that. It's not the position that Iran was in when they were negotiating the nuclear deal with, um, you know, what was known as the P5+1 that that was part of Obama's big legacy. It's not the position they were even in, you know, 2 weeks ago when they were, you know, meeting with Steve Witcoff. That's a very different world for them right now, so they're going to have to accept the terms because at any given moment Trump can say, "All right, well, if if you're if you're not going to play ball, then, uh, I'll unleash I'll, you know, I'll I'll unleash the the big dog." As the American public, I start asking myself, "Okay, wait, why are we going so hard at Iran?" So, uh, you stop them from having nuclear weapons if, like, if I'm to believe that everything has been demolished, there's going to be years and years and years. At some point this just starts to feel like you're saying, "I told you to come to the table, you're not coming to the table, and I'm bigger than you, and so I'm going to keep smashing you until you come to the table." And I do think at some point, even if I mean, look at the way that public opinion has turned on Israel. At some point, if you just keep smashing them, uh, people go, "Wait, why are we doing this?" Even if we don't have boots on the ground. Well, okay, that's a fair point, but I would argue that there are a couple things that are really good about it. The first thing is is that if Iran did go nuclear or went to the precipice of nuclear, which is basically the same thing, then there will be a proliferation cascade effect. Saudi, Egypt, Turkey, most analysts believe would go nuclear as well. So, then you have five, counting Israel, which is an undeclared program, nuclear powers in the most volatile region on Earth. And that increases exponentially chance of a nuclear exchange, which we've managed to avoid since 1945, almost miraculously. Um second of all, contrary to uh some of the sloppier commentary that I've read on the anti-war side, Iran has lots of American blood on its hands. And it doesn't go back. It's not ancient history. It's not just the Marine barracks bombing in 1983, not just Khobar Towers in the 1990s. It's the Iraq war then the Afghanistan war. They were providing insurgents with the roadside bombs known as IEDs that were maiming and killing lots of our soldiers. Um it's the fact that they they're I mean this is not a you know, intel fakery uh as Tucker Carlson recently has implied, the uh Justice Department under Joe Biden, the same Justice Department that wanted to arrest Trump, um and indict Trump, uh has two men in custody uh that they have formally charged in an unsealed indictment with trying to murder president murder Donald Trump on behalf of the Iranians. Um so that they have taken to a kind of strategy of supporting uh assassinations in our country. Masih Alinejad, the great uh Iranian women's rights activist who now lives in America, was also on that hit list, as was the former National Security Advisor John Bolton, former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. Even lower-level officials like um you know, one of Pompeo's advisers Brian Hook also on this list this is these were or you can all check them these are you know this is not again this is not sources say these were statements from the Biden administration um so this is this is a a rogue state in every sense of the term uh it's the leading state sponsor of terrorism So I'm going to lay out what I'll call my own internal conspiracy theory and you check me and tell me this is great so the way that I see this I think that um if everything moves forward swimmingly right now and Iran just engages and says look we don't want to get bombed again uh let's just play cake get Trump out of office let's buy ourselves you know three and a half years great everything will go swimmingly if however they keep down the road of pushing back um trying to exit out kicking IAEA out and um making all kinds of saber-rattling noises about you know we're um going to continue with our nuclear program uh then I think Trump would have he he would have to really get the American public on board um and I don't think he's going to be able to do that without something happening either to our servicemen so if they bombed one of our bases that would give them the cover that he needs if there really is a sleeper cell here in America and they trigger off or if there's a false flag which I don't want to get too conspiratorial but you know those are sort of the options I think where you could get the American people back on board with this um and my thinking is the reason that Trump is so hell-bent for this is that um so I've gone to the Middle East and I've been to Saudi I've been to Kuwait I've been to the UAE and man as an entrepreneur when you land there you're just like they are doing something right you're walking through the airport it feels like it's a seven-star luxury hotel it's bananas you can just feel the money everywhere uh they're making huge investments into architecture infrastructure it just it it feels like a country that has a sense of where it's headed. I think America's lost a lot of its own self sense of pride, and so we're pulling ourselves apart. They have a sense of what they have to accomplish. They know they have to get out from a reliance on oil. Trump sees an opportunity. These guys clearly have the capital. He's looking at it like almost like a VC where it's like, well, I'm America Inc. I want you to come invest a bunch of that money in America Inc., but I've got to get all of you guys to chill out and stop blowing each other up. Seems like our biggest problem here is Iran. Let's chill them out so that we can then get the Abraham Accords to spread across the region. And so he's got a reason to hammer Iran into submission, but it's not the reason that he puts forward. And so I think he's going to find himself stuck in this position of like, man, for the love of God, will you guys just calm down so that we can get economic prosperity sweeping across the nation, which is why I think he's so silent to supportive of what I have a feeling you're not going to like this, but ethnic cleansing of Gaza, where it's just literally carpet bombing. And if I'm like, okay, I've got to get that leveled out so that there's calm there so that Israel, who's clearly an economic powerhouse, they can do their thing, get Iran to calm down so that we can get Abraham Accords all across the Middle East. And now this area that has like, I'll call it a 20-year clock to modernize and get off of reliance on oil and into a modern, probably financial-based economy. I don't know if you know Ray Dalio is, but I met him in the UAE. And he was like, basically Abu Dhabi is the future of investments. And it's just like all the pieces start coming into place. And I'm like, huh. With a realist lens on, again, this just feels like, oh, I get why you've got to make Iran, the Iran problem, and the Hamas problem go away. Uh, so it'll be interesting to see how it plays out. How crazy did all of that sound? Well, no, you know, Tom, some of that makes a lot of sense. I mean, you and I disagree on ethnic cleansing, but um, I'll just concede up front on Gaza that uh, I'm sure that there were mistakes and decisions that Israel made that led to more civilians being killed, although I do think that they were in an impossible situation given the way that Hamas fights, and we should maybe bracket that for later in the conversation or maybe another episode. Um, but let's just talk about the big part of what you said, which is all right, we've got these economic titans in the Gulf. Uh, they're trying to get off the oil, and we want them to invest in America. That doesn't strike me as a conspiracy theory. That strikes me as smart American policy. That is, if we can get billions of dollars invested into the American economy, which Lord knows we need, and we can start modernizing our infrastructure maybe because of that investment or whatever it is, uh, and everybody can make money, that's seems like it's pretty good for Americans. Second of all, I do think that you have to look at what the Iran threat is not just a threat to the region, it's a threat to America. And I think Iran with a nuclear weapon would have been just a security nightmare. And for the reasons that we talked about earlier, so that was a good thing. And then finally, third, I don't know if America needs to go back. I mean, it's a very specific ask, which is the underground fortresses Natanz, Fordow, and Isfahan required a weapon that only America had, which was 33,000 tons or whatever it was, that could penetrate deep into the earth to get to these underground fortresses. Um we will have to see whether this was successful. Lots of analysts were saying that by the early, I think based on what the Israelis said today, they were successful. And so the rest of this is like I just look at Israel's capabilities. So will Americans care if Israel has to go back and take out more targets in Iran and it's not US GIs? The Iranians, again, they attacked the Al-Udeid airbase in Qatar, but they told us ahead of time, they didn't hit anything. You know what I mean? It was purely symbolic. So the Iranians with certain extent understood they didn't want to tempt the tiger. Um and I'm just saying that right now the reality is very different for Iran. They don't have a lot of options. So they're focused right now on regime survival. The sad news is, kind of getting back to our first part of the conversation, they've arrested something like 700 people. Oh. They've already killed 24 Whoa. people internally, right? So they're trying their best to prevent that democratic transition. And I think that's extremely important. But I also don't think that that's really for Trump to decide. That's again, Iranian people in the lead. I think that we can be in Trump doesn't seem interested in meddling to be honest. No, he's not interested. That's But that's kind of maybe a good thing because what you don't want us to discredit I mean the Iranian people have to be the authors of their own story. You know what I mean? They I want the Iranian people to take their country back. But I realize it's for the Iranian people to lead. So we have to support them. So I I see your point like, you know, he's trying to take care of this threat to stability in the region and the hope is is that these prosperous and wealthy countries might invest in the United States. I don't think that that's something that he would um try to cover up. I think it would be something that I mean, if he could run again, I mean, I this is a separate question. I don't think he can, but he sometimes I mean, he might a constitutional amendment and without somebody duct taping my mouth shut, there's no way. I think that that's what what you just laid out is something that would be politically popular not just with MAGA fans. I think it would be politically popular Americans. I think Americans would look at it and say, "Okay, you you defanged an enemy of the United States. You've set back their nuclear ambitions for a while. We'll see we'll see if it if it really is only a few months and we start to see them doing it again, then it'll be reassessed. But again, I think it's it's going to be a the program was really significantly damaged. Um and you've now opened up space where uh you've you've made peace between Saudi Arabia and Israel and now the Saudis and the Emiratis and uh others are going to invest in the United States. I it strikes me as just a like, you know, so much winning we're going to get sick and tired of the winning. You know what I mean? Like, all that seems pretty good to me. So, you know, I I think that the downside would be um if we found out that they they had more secret sites that even the Israelis didn't know about. The Iranians become defiant. Perhaps Khamenei keels over or he's pushed aside and the the new supreme leader or the new people in charge are uh even crazier and they can't be a little bit about that crazy because the when I the more I look at the Middle East and admittedly, you know, whatever a couple years ago this wasn't even really on my radar, but the more that I look at the Middle East, the more what I see is and take MBS who's um for my money sort of the most extreme in terms of how rapidly he's trying to pull Saudi Arabia into the 21st century. Tom, I am so glad that you said that. Uh you you're coming from an entrepreneurial background, right? Yes. You you've been to Saudi. Yes. Uh so you've seen I mean I've covered the Middle East for a long time. The Saudi Arabia after 9/11 was a Janus-faced ally. What I mean by that is that we had military assets there. We had an alliance with them going back to FDR in the 1930s. But they also exported the most poisonous and extreme jihadist Islamic ideology abroad, including by the way in in America even. So what MBS has done is something it started before him. But what he's done as the Crown Prince is he has really turned Saudi Arabia around. Saudi Arabia now is no longer in the jihad export exporting business, it's in the counter-jihad business. Ditto for the United Arab Emirates. The only country by the way that's still Janus-faced in that regard is Qatar and that's another story, but all of the other Gulf kingdoms, all these other Gulf states have turned it around on this. That was our number one issue besides Pakistan, which is a separate problem, after 9/11. These countries are finally doing it for themselves and they're reaping the reward with this economic boom. Um so I'm so glad that you mentioned that because as you probably remember, wasn't so long ago, that there's a there's a dark side of MBS, which is he had a contributor to the Washington Post murdered in um Ankara, I bore Istanbul, in Turkey, and that was exposed by the Turks. And uh the Democratic Party in particular, Trump was the president then, wanted to basically cut off relations with Saudi Arabia. I am so grateful they didn't succeed, even though what I think he did to uh Jamal Khashoggi was a heinous crime. Heinous. Um so, it's I guess what I'm saying is what I appreciated about your comment there, cuz I know you knew about that, is it's shows that geopolitics is not a morality tale. It's not an allegory. It's not a heroic journey. There are usually choices between bad and worse. And sometimes you have to ex- you have kind of have to live with this guy did some very bad things to his domestic political opponents. But, he is finally doing what we have pleaded with the Saudis for generations to do, which is to get out of this kind of jihad export business. We'll get back to the show in a second, but first let's talk about what's happening out there. Business is chaos right now. Trade wars, supply chain disasters, cash flow problems. If you can't adapt fast, you are finished. Complete visibility into everything is your key to survival, and that's exactly what NetSuite by Oracle delivers, and it's why over 41,000 businesses depend on it. NetSuite is the number one cloud ERP because it brings everything together in one place. Hey. Your accounting, your finances, your inventory, your HR, all of it connected. The AI in NetSuite handles all the repetitive tasks automatically, so your team can focus on what actually moves the needle. NetSuite shows you exactly what's stuck, what it's costing you, and how to fix it fast. If your revenue is at least seven figures, download the free ebook Navigating Global Trade, Three Insights for Leaders at netsuite.com/theory. Again, that's netsuite.com/theory. And now, let's get back to the show. Yeah, I mean, this is where I get fascinated with the other side of what you do with the Breaking History podcast. As a student of history, but sort of a a latecomer to history, man, you look back in history at our own nation, and you just see an a never-ending string of tragedy and horrors. Uh so, it's like to some extent, it's like, what's your goal? Where are you trying to get to? I definitely look at this all through a very realist lens. I think Trump does as well, and I think he's misunderstood because people are grappling trying to find like uh ideology. And what you're going to see, I think, if you map Trump as somebody who looks at everything as a business deal to be done, trying to bring prosperity back to America in in no uncertain terms, in ways that help him, and in ways that help him that make me deeply uncomfortable. But nonetheless, again, not saying I agree with anything, just looking at, okay, how's this playing out? What's the North Star? Going uh to these countries, making sure that you're participating in the wealth party. Like that, suddenly it you can make sense of the way that he moves. Um so, looking at the Middle East as that as this future hub of uh certainly investment. I think wherever you find the hub of investment, you're going to find the hub of innovation. And I can feel the energy, the the psychological, cultural energy draining out of America, um and rushing into the Middle East. Surprisingly enough, nobody was more surprised than me. I'm very interested to see what happens to China. That's like my personal focus. Um, and when I see all of that, I'm like, "Yeah, we have to do something to ensure that America does not slide down the totem pole, which from where I'm sitting, we are very much in risk of doing." But, in a sense, just a counter, I mean, I I First of all, I share your concern. I think we have deep institutional problems. I think we have a politics that doesn't work. I think we have a real crisis in our universities where there's a kind of a bourgeois radicalism that um you know, kind of has has really crippled in many ways the humanities at least in our universities. Have you paid attention to the New York mayoral race? Oh, God, don't get me started. Um Well, I'm trying to get you started. Yeah, well, you know, I mean, that's a real challenge. I think that all of his ideas are uh well, I they have been tried and they've failed. Uh as a Jew and a Zionist, I I don't like, you know, his his spin on global intifada and things like that, but leaving that aside, I mean, the idea that you're going to have a mayor First of all, the mayor doesn't have the ability to do a rent freeze that he's promising. So, good luck with that. But, we know Every economist, you know, every economist looks at rent freezes and says, "All you're doing is you're shrinking the availability of apartments." You know You know what I mean? Like, all you're doing is you're you're shrinking the supply, and there's obviously great demand in New York. Um you want city-run, state-run grocery stores? I mean, I don't want that. I don't think Americans really want that. Um So, that yeah, I mean, I'm I'm super You know, I Yes, that's that that that's a problem. So, I see your I share your concern. On the other hand, I don't know. America's a really big country. I've been to Austin, Texas and I see a lot of innovation. Um I you know, in some ways I think Austin might be the kind of beneficiary and people fleeing the Bay Area and Silicon Valley because of the crazy things are happening in in in uh in California and the dysfunction of their state government. Um and you know, but I do think in a in a way these things are interconnected. America like to have a 12-day war that so far looks like a big win for America and Israel to demonstrate that we can kind of do and Israel can do what, you know, might seem like science fiction. That is a boost to our prestige. It's a boost to our value. Um and I would just say this cuz it's something I disagreed with Trump in his Middle East and what and his speeches in in in in Saudi. Yes, it's a great thing to look at Dubai and Abu Dhabi and Riyadh and to marvel at how these cities and you're right, that the airports feel like seven-star hotels. That's a great line. And they deserve some credit. But one of the reasons why they were able to have the space to invest in their economies that way and to turn their countries around is because they didn't have to deal with the prospect because America, you know, fought ISIS. America took out the the instability and the the drivers of instability more importantly. I would say, you know, had no Had America not used its Air Force to destroy the ISIS caliphate in the mid-2010s, which was started by Obama but really finished by Trump, what would you Do you think that there would be this economic miracle we're seeing in the Gulf? I don't. I think you would have seen a spread of this extremist kind of terrorism and um it you know, it and I think that dealing with Iran um and the threat that Iran imposed particularly on the nuclear side uh opens up more space because Iran was an enemy of the Gulf countries at the end of the day as well. Um so the those things are kind of locked together. But I also want to just emphasize and agree with you that we need to turn our own country around so we can have some of that innovation and get that spirit back. I'm at the end of the day a an optimist about America. I think we've had I mean you talk about history uh we had a really rough run from the late '60s to like the early '80s. We had a tough 15 years. Um but we managed to sort of get out of that and then we had you know, all of the benefits of the internet and the personal computer and all the things that sort of we take for granted today. Um so I again I'm an I remain an optimist about America in that regard, but I also am a realistic optimistic and then I'm and then I'm appreciative that you you know, you sort of see it and you're not just satisfied with mediocrity. You're not just satisfied with inefficiency, not just status satisfied with like stagnation. That's very important. Yeah, definitely not that. Um now going back to the I see an idea playing out in the Middle East that I would love to get your color on and the idea goes like this. You have different factions of Muslims themselves that are trying to modernize and just as Christianity has changed over time, the Muslim religion feels like it's going in two different directions. You've got people that are recognizing the future is going to be economic, it's going to be financial investments. They've got to be a place that the whole world feels comfortable making investments and coming in and they're going to feel safe. And then you have um what I'll call more fundamentalist, more extremist for sure, and they're not focused on life in the here and now. They're focused on martyrdom in the life hereafter. And my when I first started looking at what was going on in Gaza, I just kept saying, "Look, I don't understand what's going on well enough, but I will just tell you this. If you have a population that does not care about their kids' lives being economically better than their life in the here and now and their kids' kids' lives being even better than theirs, um you will have this problem. If people feel like the fast track to a good life when you're living in squalor is like you can, you know, get on the the fast pass by going in suicide bombing or getting yourself killed, um you're going to have a problem. And so somehow, some way, it feels like there's uh uh like this is going to sound so stupid, and forgive me, but you need a version of the Pope who is going to help people navigate an update of the religion where they have religious credibility, but they're saying, I mean, essentially, like God is saying this. And so, I don't know how we get to that, but it feels like um you're going to have a hard time stamping out through violence, not that it's impossible, but you're going to have a hard time stamping out through violence, uh the notion of jihad. You're You're I think going to need some sort of um leading a way through religious scholarship to help people into a modern perspective. That's a very shrewd point. Now, I I know a little bit about this. Uh again, I'm Jewish, but I'm a journalist and I've covered the Middle East for a while. Shia religion has something like that. You have grand ayatollahs in Shiism. Uh and the sort of seat of this Shia religion is uh in Najaf and Karbala in Iraq. And in fact, the Grand Ayatollah of Iran, the supreme leader, is not as high-ranking a religious authority as the leaders of of of the Grand Ayatollahs in Najaf and Karbala. So, in Shia, which is a which is a minority of the Muslim faith, you sort of have something like maybe a kind of pope-like system, although it's certainly not the same. In Sunni Islam, you don't have anything quite like that. And if and you do have the ability of like, you know, anyone can kind of say, if you're an Imam, "This is what I see as the the the way." Now, what you're talking about with the ideology behind Hamas, um it's sometimes known as political Islam. It comes The modern version of it comes out of Egypt, and particularly a figure named Hassan al-Banna. And that was this view that the the reason why these Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim states have fallen behind, uh and this starts at the beginning of the 20th century. So, you had a rough, you know, most of the Arab world was were colonies then, either part of the Ottoman Empire or later the British or the French, uh you know, depending on what what part of the Middle East you were talking about. Uh but the reason why, you know, we were once, you know, a world-conquering empire under Muhammad, where Islam spread as far as uh Afghanistan, you know, to the east and to Spain and even parts of France to the west, um is because we have forsaken we are we're no longer um you know, organizing our societies politically based on Islamic laws, and that's why it's called political Islam. So, this has been a powerful idea, and it's a powerful idea that is built that's sort of based in this notion of like looking around and saying why did we kind of getting back to our earlier conversation, why did we stagnate? Why did we fall behind while the rest of the world sort of surpassed us? And this was the answer. Well, um you might look at the operations against Iran because Iran is, you know, modern Iran uh the Shah falls in 1979 in Islamic Revolution. And they are implementing the Shia version of this Muslim Brotherhood or political Islam. Um we saw the caliphate for ISIS try this. For a period of time, Sudan was run uh by figure named uh Turabi who also sort of talked about these things. For the most part, all these movements have failed. Al-Qaeda has failed. ISIS has failed. And Iran is now failing. And eventually, perhaps, the way to get to what you're talking about is for a new set of thinkers to say, "For 120 years, we've tried political Islam and it's brought nothing but war and misery. So, let's try something else." So, eventually, you know, ideas matter and this and and and and you, you know, there's a kind of cliche you can't kill an idea with bullets and bombs. Well, you kind of can. You know, I mean Agreed. You know what I'm saying? I mean, like there are people in America today who call themselves neo-Nazis. But, let's be honest, National Socialism was defeated in a war. Uh there there is still an emperor in Japan, but people do not worship the emperor in Japan the way they did uh you know, before the end of World War II. Um so, yeah, we'll you know, only time will tell, but this is such a humiliating defeat for the really the leading Islamist or political Islamic power on the planet um that was interested in you know creating these little statelets whether it's the Houthis, Hezbollah, Hamas, what do they have all in common? Some are Shia, some are Sunni, but they all kind of are political Islamists. And um hey, how's it how's it how's it working out for you? I mean the leadership of Hamas gone. The Hassan Nasrallah, the leadership of Hezbollah gone. Uh the one the Houthis at the very beginning of the war suffered a pretty significant blow. Gone. Not not all of them, but I'm saying the point is is that it has been a it's they have been losing. And at a certain point that will have to create the space for some new ideas to come through and I don't know what that's going to look like. You hit the nail on the head in that it is a religious issue and you need to have these religious leaders and they're out there. That's the other thing is that there are there are different shades of of Islamist theologians and people, you know, in in revered institutions like Al-Azhar Mosque and universities in Cairo. I spent some a lot of time I lived in Cairo for a year and a half. Um that have a very different view of things. But now you're sort of seeing that um you know, we're we're seeing in real time that these these ideas don't work and so the hope is that it you demoralize the fanatics and that you create the space for somebody to say, "Wait a second, there is another way." Which gets back to the other point you were making which is that MBS is a Muslim, he's a religious man. I don't think you could question his piety in some ways. Uh in his personal life per se, but he's not a jihadist. And look at Saudi Arabia. You've been there. It's turned around. Um look at Abu Dhabi. Look at Dubai. Yeah. Um in some ways those are the sort of examples that you hold up and you say, "There is another way." Um and that that's and that's how you you sort of deal with the the ideological intellectual poisoning I think that is represented by this ideology. Did you look at all into Epstein? Uh, I'm very intrigued by Epstein. Um, I must say that I didn't believe the story that he killed himself in the jail. But I'm intrigued by the fact makes two of us. Yeah, but I'm intrigued by the fact that that Dan Bongino who I know devote a lot of time when he was a radio host to this issue, he's the deputy director of the FBI and he said, "Hey, I've looked at it." Kash Patel said he looked at it. I mean, I don't see why Kash Patel or Dan Bongino would cover it up. Maybe we'll find out that they did cover it up. I just don't see that they would cover it up. Um, I think by the way, on the on the Epstein stuff, um, cuz I think I know where you might be going with that. Is it true that intelligence services, not just Israel, but let's just let's be real, intelligence services, this is in the world intelligence, uh, engage in what they call honey traps which is to have information uh, that could compromising information on individuals to use against you in order to uh, blackmail somebody to do their bidding. That is a sad fact of life. That's something that happens. Lots of intelligence services do that kind of thing. So crazy. Um, I have not seen persuasive evidence that Epstein's island uh, with all the underage girls and everything like that was really a front for the Mossad. Or and somebody by the way, I've seen it both ways. I've seen the CIA and Mossad. Um, I don't know that that I don't know that. I And again, let's just use Occam's razor again, Tom, and I don't know where you are in this, but it seems more likely that powerful men, people who would be friends with Epstein, wealthy men, ex-presidents like Bill Clinton and or or Sean Combs or whoever, uh like the idea of kind of uh you know, sex with young women. That's been true about uh for a long time. I think Epstein clearly was a sex you know, was had a voracious sexual appetite. He had gazillions of dollars and this is what he liked to do and what it it could just very well be that here's a guy who uh was doing the kind of thing that you you know, I mean going back to before the Roman Empire, you know, and powerful men, this is what they do. Did it necessarily mean that they were doing it uh in order to kind of have blackmail information on people? Again, I haven't seen that. What I've seen is some connections between Ghislaine Maxwell and I guess her father, you know, but that that's not proof. To me though, this just seems and look, I get it. This is one of the conspiracies that I indulge in. I try not to indulge in conspiracies very often, but this one just seems too perfect. It's like, "Hey guys, don't worry. We got it. Files coming out. Yep, yep. No worries. Oh, sorry, no file for you. Uh hey, we're going to be releasing that video. We just got to clean it up just real quick." Like, clean it up? What are you talking about? Release the video as it is. you, but like why do you think what's in it for Bongino and Patel? Oh, nothing. I don't think I think for them this is a train wreck. You know what I'm saying? I why would they go along with it? Okay, so pure conjecture. I have no idea that this is true. Think of me as a science fiction writer right now, uh absolutely making something up, but it would go something like this. Um I was I start out as just a a person who really is idealistic. I'm working in the government and suddenly I'm being attacked. Uh then when I'm asked to be the person that comes in and like really, "Hey, do something for your country. Come in and do it." Uh, and you think, "Oh my god, okay, this is going to be a lot, but you know, you don't say no. Like when your country calls, you go in." So, they both go in and then the men in black suits that Putin keeps talking about telling everybody, "You you want to know why policy never changes? Because it's not the president that runs the country, it's men in black suits that come up and say, 'Listen, this is how things really go.'" And they come in and they're like Tom, before you go on, you don't think Trump's the decider? Well, here is the really bad news. Uh, given how long Trump was friends with Epstein, oh buddy, can I just I have a really hard time believing that that is not going to be in some way, shape, or form very inconvenient for him. Hold on. Hold on. Wait. Wait. Slow slow down. Slow down. Donald Trump had everything and the kitchen sink thrown at him. He was sued by multiple women for rape. He was accused by former heads of our own intelligence services of being a Russian asset. This is somebody who I think is immune to coercion in that regard. So, what I'm saying is that I can't imagine there be anything on the Epstein stuff the Epstein files that would be even worse than what Trump has already been accused of and nearly, by the way, lost his freedom for. So, and his fortune for. When I look at that, I say, "There's something fishy about the Epstein file." And that I could easily see, to your point about powerful men just going to powerful men, and that this is every side of the aisle, every which way but loose. And so, there's just nobody wants this thing to get out there. It just seems impossible. Just release everything. Uh, yeah, I'll remain, um, sort of playfully suspicious until it gets released. I'm all for releasing everything. I think the evidence now tells us that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. But I still want to release all the stuff from the CIA. I did a whole podcast episode on that, which is pretty good. They did release everything, right? They pretty much have. I mean, but what I'm saying is I was in favor of that disclosure, um, because I just think it's our history. We We We We have a right to it. Um, and better to kind of let it all out. I mean, unfortunately, um, I mean, that's a whole separate conversation about Kennedy. Even though in the end I I don't believe there was a conspiracy, I just think that the government response to it was so, uh, duplicitous that I understand why lots of people don't believe the official version of the Warren Report. Um, and I think to a certain extent with Jeffrey Epstein, he clearly got favorable treatment initially from these legal allegations until by the way, until he didn't, right? But for years, I mean, like he had that he had a sweetheart deal in Florida and everything like that. But the explanation for that is not that the deep state was protecting an asset. The explanation I see is that, oh, well, what does it tell us? It tells us something we already knew. That wealthy, privileged people have a different standard of justice than the rest of us. Do you see what I'm saying? Like I That That That we knew when I could have told you that from the O.J. trial, right? I mean, like that's just how it is. That's why people pay a lot of money for the best lawyers. It's why, um, you know, it's it's you know, it's it's it's why people donate to politicians. But I think there's a difference between control and like a system that we have where there's a lot of people who can buy influence, but doesn't mean it's not the same as control. Um, but that's not I don't want to dismiss where you're coming from though because we have a vast national intelligence bureaucracy, a vast national security state. Um I don't think it's the same as a deep state. Um but I do think that it's something that is overweening and needs more accountability and we have to maybe rethink in some ways. Given that Israel is still not done with Hamas, how do they um wrap that up? How do they decide like we've now got everybody or whatever and then Yeah. um what do you make of how the public opinion has turned against them? Well, I mean it's it's depends on what segment of the public opinion. Certainly younger people, certainly College and university. Yeah, certainly younger than universities have uh I I mean I think it's been turning even before October 7th. Um I I certainly hope that there's a they're close to getting the hostages back which I think is sort of the remaining issue. But the real issue is that like you can't have a remnant of Hamas still be in charge of Gaza. That's a red line. But I do think that, you know, Israeli elections I don't think most Israelis want to reoccupy Gaza. I don't think it's a territorial expansion. I think that there are some Israelis who are in the cabinet like Ben-Gvir and Smotrich who have a fantasy but it's a fantasy that the that that that Jews can settle in Gaza and so forth. Um I think there's going to have to be a huge kind of reconstruction of Gaza but that reconstruction has to happen under a different leadership than Hamas. But I also think that we're fairly close and I have even though there are these tragic stories of Palestinians waiting for food to be delivered by this new kind of humanitarian effort. Uh I think it's called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation, the Israelis and I think Americans contractors have set up. To me that is a ray of hope and I think Hamas has been trying has been attacking these things and and and and trying to do what they can to sabotage it cuz I think that that removes the last bit of leverage that Hamas has over the population. I think the population in Gaza, we've seen some flickers of this, are absolutely furious with the decisions that were made by their leaders that plunged them into war. Hamas started the war with October 7th. Uh, I don't see how anybody could have expected the Israelis wouldn't respond with overwhelming force, which is what they did. Um, I hate that the war has dragged on because it has been it's been terrible for Palestinian civilians. I am not of the view that no one in in Gaza is innocent. I think there are a lot of people who are innocent. I think the Gazans are double victims of Hamas and Israeli bombardment. And it's a it's a tragedy. But I also kind of begin to see the light at the end of the tunnel and I think that the victory in this 12-day war is a big part of that. I mean, if there's any rational actors left in the remnants of Hamas leadership, they should be looking around at this point and saying to themselves, "What are we fighting for?" And that's that's that's hopefully where we're where we're headed. I love it. Eli, man, I can't thank you enough for taking the time. Where can people follow you? Uh, well, make sure to subscribe to Breaking History. It's a great podcast and uh, read me at the Free Press. I'm a columnist there and I am also contributing editor at Commentary Magazine. If you like this conversation, check out this episode to learn more. Jeffrey Epstein's story was never about sex. It was an illusion. Like the dress, some see as blue and others see as gold. Intelligence agencies exploit the same trick. They shape what you notice and distort what it means. Enter Kompromat, the art of collecting dirt